http://pus.sagepub.com/content/early/2014/09/02/0963662514548135
http://www.sagepublications.com
Additional services and information for Public Understanding of Science can be found at:
Email Alerts: http://pus.sagepub.com/cgi/alerts
Subscriptions: http://pus.sagepub.com/subscriptions
Reprints: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.nav
Permissions: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav
Citations: http://pus.sagepub.com/content/early/2014/09/02/0963662514548135.refs.html
OnlineFirst Version of Record
What is This?
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

548135
Candela and Mariotto
Theoretical/ Research Paper
P U S
Public Understanding of Science
1 –16
© The Author(s) 2014
Reprints and permissions: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav
DOI: 10.1177/0963662514548135 pus.sagepub.com
University of Insubria, Italy
Abstract
This work uses a qualitative approach coupled with a quantitative software-based methodology to examine the Italian news media coverage of radiation in the early decades of the twentieth century. We analyze
80 news stories from two of the most influential Italian newspapers from that time: La Stampa (a daily newspaper) and La Domenica del Corriere (an Italian Sunday supplement). While much of previous research on media coverage of scientific topics was generally focused on present-day news, our work revolves around the ground-breaking discovery of X-rays and radioactivity at the dawn of the last century. Our analysis aims to identify journalistic frames in the news coverage of radiation that journalists might have used to emphasize the benefits (or the risks) of the new discoveries. We also hypothesize how this kind of news coverage might have influenced public perception of technological, commercial, and public health applications of the new scientific advancements.
Keywords history of science, Italy, news media, newspapers, radiation, radioactivity, science and popular culture, science journalism, TalTac ® , X-rays
For most people, the world of science is what they read in newspapers and magazines. Indeed, it is through the filter of journalistic language and imagery that the lay public addresses scientific topics and problems (Nelkin, 1995). This was particularly true in the early decades of the twentieth century, when citizens had fewer opportunities than today to gain in-depth knowledge of science. The way in which the news press covers scientific topics has increasingly become a subject of research
(e.g. Bauer and Bucchi, 2007; Benelli, 2003; Bucchi and Trench, 2008; Epstein, 1981; Galtung and
Corresponding author:
Andrea Candela, Department of Theoretical and Applied Sciences, University of Insubria, Via Mazzini 5, 21100 Varese,
Italy.
Email: andrea.candela@uninsubria.it
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

2 Public Understanding of Science
Ruge, 1965; Gamson and Modigliani, 1989; Golding and Elliott, 1979; Jensen, 2002; Neresini and
Magaudda, 2011; Nisbet and Lewenstein, 2002; Pasquaré and Oppizzi, 2012; Tuchman, 1977).
The above studies are mainly focused on the present-day scenario and deal with controversial issues of public debate; comparatively, there has been less emphasis on the news coverage of science in the past decades (Bucchi, 2011; LaFollette, 1990). Hence, through this research we tried to fill this gap by focusing on the Italian coverage of X-rays and radioactivity in the first decades of the twentieth century.
The way science and scientists are perceived by the lay public undoubtedly depends on social process of knowledge construction. Popular understanding of scientific phenomena can be considered as a set of cognitive and experiential “tools,” which the lay public uses to explain texts, construct meanings, and express feelings toward science and technology. They are made up of words, sentences, frames, archetypes, images, and ideas that belong to a given society (Farr and Moscovici,
1984; Giere, 1988; Thurs, 2007). The popular reaction to the discovery of X-rays and radioactivity represents a good example of the above.
Our research has focused on news stories from two distinguished and well-known Italian media outlets: La Stampa , founded in 1894, still one of the widest-circulating and influential broadsheets in Italy, and La Domenica del Corriere , the Sunday supplement of Corriere della Sera (the most prestigious Italian broadsheet, published since 1876). We selected a daily newspaper and a popular, illustrated weekly newspaper as these are most suitable for analyzing a satisfactory range of stories marked by different journalistic and narrative styles. It is worth noting that Sunday supplements used to meet a wide target of readers, often including semiliterate people, who were mostly fascinated by colorful illustrations (Bordoni and Fossati, 1985; Candela, 2013: 169–173). La Domenica del Corriere , published from 1899 to 1989, was designed to be a weekly newspaper featuring odd, curious, and intriguing facts of the week (Pallottino, 1988). Hence, periodical popular publications were often more sensationalist than the daily press. Indeed, in the Italian general press scenario of the early twentieth century, the boundaries between yellow journalism, penny press , and “ elitist ” journalism were far from fixed (Gozzini, 2000; Lee, 1976; Mott, 1950; Murialdi, 1996).
We critically analyzed the content of 80 news stories centered on the radiation topic, published in La Stampa and La Domenica del Corriere from 1896, after the discovery of X-rays by Wilhelm
Conrad Röntgen in 1895, until the end of the 1930s. We then analyzed quantitatively a selection of our sample by means of TalTac ® , a powerful text analysis software.
With the notable exception of one innovative study (Willis, 1995), most of the works on public perception and representation of radiation revolved around the emergence, after World War II
(WWII), of an ambiguous and often negative connotation of nuclear energy, mostly associated with the terms “risk” and “danger” (Broderick, 1996; Hecht, 1998; Hendershot, 1997; Shapiro,
2002; van Lente, 2012; Weart, 1988). In the second half of the century, after the dropping of the atomic bomb on Japan and the nuclear tests in the Pacific islands, the media’s slant became increasingly “negative.” Public narratives of radioactivity, radiation, and nuclear physics were often associated with archetypical pictures, frequently influenced by mythology and religion
(Weart, 1985, 1988). As already pointed out by Matthew Lavine (2013), “Bradley enumerates the iconography of the Nuclear Age: the rubble of Hiroshima, the Doomsday clock, Bert the Turtle, and Slim Pickens perched atop an atom bomb [in Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove ]” (p. 6)
(Bradley, 2000). We can also list many other collective images, such as the genie of the lamp,
Young Frankenstein, Godzilla, Pandora’s Box, the Jewish Golem, Černobyl, Fukushima, and a
“multi-colored” imaginary populated by monsters, alchemists, mad scientists, and invisible
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

Candela and Mariotto 3 enemies or poisons (Morrisson, 2007; Rosenthal, 1991; Weart, 1985, 1988; Zeman and Amundson,
2004). But what kind of framing and iconography was used by the media when reporting on radiation before the bomb? The above topics have been discussed in some good works, which have considered various issues from different points of view. For instance, Spencer R. Weart’s book
(1988) is a significant contribution to the definition of the cultural and psychological origins of symbols and images that are still associated with nuclear energy. There are also very interesting studies dealing with the ways in which X-rays and radioactivity came into the public consciousness in the first decades of the twentieth century. Rebecca Herzig’s engaging investigation on the
“inside story” of X-ray depilation is an analysis of the “larger problems of race, sex, and science in the interwar period” (Herzig, 1999). Claudia Clark’s historical research on the radiation poisoning of female factory workers at the United States Radium Corporation (Orange, New Jersey) in the 1920s is a cornerstone in the definition of the “American nuclear culture.” It is essentially a study of the industrial health reform (Clark, 1997). Finally, another three major research efforts are worthy of mention: the work published by Carolyn Thomas de la Peña (2003), the interesting book by Maria Rentetzi, who also focuses on the European community of radioactivity research
(Rentetzi, 2007), and the recent analysis by Matthew Lavine on the American popularization of radiation during the “first atomic age” (Lavine, 2013).
According to Matthew Lavine, “The 1910s and 1920s saw the vulgarization of radiation” (Lavine,
2013: 140). Likewise, Carolyn Thomas de la Peña used the word “ radiomania ” for defining the huge scientific and public interest in radiation at the turn of the last century (de la Peña, 2003:
170–191). The collective imagination was fascinated, and sometimes frightened, by the discovery of X-rays and radioactivity (1895–1903). Public interest in radiation was fueled by public performances and lectures, periodicals and newspapers showing and talking about the ambiguous power emitted by those eerie physical phenomena. Soon, interesting potential therapeutic applications of radiation were revealed and widely popularized. That enormous public interest had little connection with the possible practical applications of X-rays and radium at first. For instance, the new kind of “photography” discovered by Röntgen was initially considered a weird and amazing power, able to penetrate bodies (Brecher and Brecher, 1969; Lavine, 2013: 17). So, an X-ray picture of a
9-week child could be purchased as a souvenir for a few dollars in 1897 (Rachino and Rachino,
2009). Several scientists and scholars were also suggesting, in their public lectures, the possible use of radiation for energy production, without hiding the possibility of risky military applications
(Sclove, 1989; Soddy, 1903, 1909; Weart, 1988).
The lay public played an active role in the process of public circulation and appropriation of the new scientific knowledge, taking part in every sort of discussion about, debate on, and exhibition of the unusual phenomena unveiled by the scientists’ investigations into the realm of atoms and matter. The science of radiation began to gain considerable public attention, both in the United
States and in Europe in 1903, after the discovery of heat emissions produced by atomic disintegration and the Nobel Prize to the Curies and Antoine Henri Becquerel. Moreover, starting from the first decade of last century, X-rays and radium began to be commercialized in every possible way: not only in the form of technological devices but also of “books, lectures, and news reports”
(Lavine, 2013: 7), as well as commercial campaigns. X-rays soon became a useful brand, able to satisfy different marketing strategies. In the early-twentieth-century America, there were several examples of that peculiar business, such as X-ray razor blades, X-ray whiskey, X-ray soap (1898), headache tablets (1899), and X-ray stove polish (1902). The list could be much longer, including floor wax, condoms, antiseptic ointments, lamp reflectors, and so on (Gerson, 2004; Herzig, 1999;
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

4 Public Understanding of Science
Lavine, 2013: 69). From the late 1910s to 1930s, the popular perception of radiation was also influenced by the growth of a “technological market,” which was mainly aimed at personal care and made of singular objects for “everyday” use, such as the shoe store fluoroscopy machine, also known as X-ray Shoe Fitter or Pedoscope (Lavine, 2013: 5), and lotions, hair tonics, anti-wrinkle creams, muds, clothes, toothpastes, soaps, food, and pills based on radium (Candela, 2013: 54–68).
“The efficacy of these products was questionable at best. […] That such products were bought purposefully, even though few contained even a trace of radium, suggests intense desire on the part of Americans to believe that radium could safely interact with the body,” wrote Carolyn Thomas de la Peña (2003: 190). Additionally, the development of a cultural industry around radioactivity was well exemplified through a variety of interesting social phenomena, both in the United States and in Europe, such as the “elitist habit” of thermal baths in radioactive waters for therapeutic purposes and, from the 1920s, the spread of radioactive solutions and drinking waters, such as the well-known Radithor . Some curious medical devices, made of metal or ceramics and used to add radioactivity to drinking water, were also commercialized (Macklis, 1990; Rachino and Rachino,
2009; Stannard, 1988).
As Lavine (2013) pointed out,
A patient of 1905, sitting for her first x-ray examination, would most likely have a fairly good idea of what the actual machine could do, what sorts of ailments it could diagnose, and what its images would look like.
But she would also have a decade’s worth of experiences of ‘x-ray’ as a rhetorical and metaphorical entity: within that time the word had come to connote omniscient, penetrating, exposure (psychological and physical), modern, mystical, vital, inscrutable, and scientific. Radium might be, for such a person, at various times an intellectual curiosity, a sign of the times, a symbol of wealth, a consumer novelty, and a medicine of last resort. (p. 4)
In a similar vein, expressions, coming from alchemy, mythology, and religion, such as mysterious emanations, invisible messengers, shadows of the fatal fading of the body, magic elements, marvelous cure, fountains of youth, and gold of the alchemists, were very frequent in the main
European and American newspapers (Candela, 2013; Sclove, 1989). They were lexical and semantic expedients suitable for describing, representing, and also understanding the unusual properties of radium. The “X-ray mania” and “radiomania” lasted several years, as illustrated by the already cited works (de la Peña, 2003; Lavine, 2013; Rentetzi, 2007). It was during the second decade of the century, and chiefly after World War I (WWI), that radiation quickly obtained much public attention and media coverage. It might be useful to point out that although ionizing electromagnetic radiations and radioactive rays are different physical phenomena, their distinction was not clear in the public discourse. They were often confused with each other and regarded as the same phenomenon by both the lay public and journalists. Even the experts sometimes argued that X-rays and radioactive emissions were the same thing.
Media coverage undoubtedly plays an important role in affecting public opinion about scientific issues, such as nuclear power (Gamson and Modigliani, 1989), technological and environmental hazards (Wiegman et al., 1989), biotechnology (Nisbet and Lewenstein, 2002), nanotechnology
(Gorss et al., 2005; Lewenstein et al., 2007), nutrition, and public health (Pasquaré et al., 2013).
Several studies have shown that the media do so by using certain, and often stereotypical, frames of reference (Candela, 2013; Castells, 2009; Entman, 1993; Gavrila, 2012; Gilliam and Bales,
2001; Guizzardi, 2002; Neuman et al., 1992; Nisbet and Lewenstein, 2002). They affect how
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

Candela and Mariotto 5
Figure 1.
Frequency of news articles in time, from 1896 to 1940. The 4-year time interval corresponding to World War I is indicated as “WWI.”
WWI: World War I.
societies and individuals perceive science and scientists by selecting information, making some aspects more relevant than others, and sometimes mixing facts with fiction, emotional gradations
(hopes, fears, etc.), and collective imagination (Candela, 2013: 144–161; Darnton, 1975; Hajer,
1995; Ong, 1988; Pasquaré and Oppizzi, 2012).
The concept of framing has long been investigated and discussed by disciplines such as psychology (Feinberg and Willer, 2013; Nelson et al., 1997), sociology (e.g. Benford and
Snow, 2000), political science (e.g. Chong and Druckman, 2007), and media science (e.g.
Anderson, 2009). The focus of media studies about framing is to understand how an object or event can be presented from a particular point of view, a process that implies a strategic (conscious or subconscious) selection of features for a particular purpose (Chapman and Lupton,
1994; Entman, 1993; Iyengar, 1991; Ryan, 1991; Schon and Rein, 1994; Wallack and Dorfman,
1996; Wallack et al., 1993). As highlighted by Iyengar (1991), people are generally not so well-informed on most issues of scientific interest, and therefore framing of such issues by the news media can strongly affect people’s response and perception, typically in terms of the risks and benefits associated with scientific discoveries. Analysis of media framing processes can hence provide crucial insights into how the media can determine the possible acceptance or rejection of a given scientific or technological innovation (Castells, 2009; Goffman, 1974).
We analyzed 80 news stories published by La Stampa and La Domenica del Corriere in the early decades of the twentieth century. The Sunday supplement of the Corriere della Sera was the best-selling weekly newspaper in the 1920s and 1930s (Mariani, 1976). La Stampa ’s daily circulation at the turn of last century was 50,000. Back then, the most-read Italian daily newspaper was Il Secolo (which was closed in 1927) with more than 100,000 copies at that time.
However, Corriere della Sera soon exceeded 150,000 daily copies in first years of the twentieth century, and La Stampa ’s daily circulation reached 100,000 copies between 1910 and 1920
(Murialdi, 1996: 101–102). Along with the weekly La Domenica del Corriere , we chose La
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

6 Public Understanding of Science
Stampa , instead of Corriere della Sera or Il Secolo , for the following reasons: (1) Il Secolo would not have been suitable as it was closed in 1927; hence, its news stories would cover only a part of the time window considered in our research and (2) our purpose was to select print media outlets that would not only be different in terms of journalistic style (a weekly magazine vs a newspaper) but also in terms of journalistic/editorial approach toward the radiation topic. As La Domenica del Corriere was owned by the same editorial group as Corriere della Sera , we thought it is appropriate to consider the other major broadsheets of the time, that is, La Stampa .
We scanned the archives of both media outlets for stories containing words related to the radiation topic and initially gathered 128 news stories; then, we refined our sample by dropping articles that only incidentally mentioned radiation, among other scientific discoveries. Our final sample comprised 20 news stories published in La Domenica del Corriere from 1904 to 1934 and 60 articles published in La Stampa from 1896 to 1940. As shown in Figure 1, the amount of coverage in time is characterized by two spikes, one before WWI and another after WWI. The spikes in journalistic coverage correspond to key events, the Nobel Prize for physics awarded to the Curies and Becquerel in 1903 and the death of M. Curie in 1934, respectively. The news stories were first studied through a qualitative approach: we focused on the headlines, plot, journalistic slant, location in the newspaper, trend in news coverage, and, finally, framing (positive/ benefit or negative/risk). After the qualitative analysis phase, we selected 30 stories (out of the total of 80), picking out the longest, most detailed, and complete ones from the two “groups” that correspond to the spikes in Figure 1. In fact, the articles written in correspondence of the key events of 1903 and 1934 were focused much more specifically on the scientific and health implications of radiation and were hence most suitable for our quantitative analysis of how the topic was framed in the news.
The software used for our quantitative research is TalTac, suitable for analyzing huge databases for content and investigating journalistic language. The most useful tool provided by TalTac is one that enables to define the degree to which any single word is used in the investigated texts in comparison with the usage of that single word in a database of 270,000,000 occurrences embedded within the software, which was assembled by the software developers through the collection of all news articles published by the Italian daily newspaper La Repubblica from 1990 to 1999. The software automatically calculates the frequency with which any given keyword is featured in the study database and yields a numerical value (deviation on occurrences, DOs) that represents how much that keyword is over- or under-represented in the study database in comparison with its average use in journalistic language.
TalTac calculates DOs based on the following formula
DO= f − f * f * where f is the frequency with which the keyword is used in the study database and f * is the frequency with which that same keyword is used in the software’s reference database. When DO for any term in the study database is >0, we can assume that this term has been used more frequently than in the average journalistic language. When DO for any term in the study database is <0, we can assume that this term has been used less frequently than in the average journalistic language
(Bolasco and Pavone, 2010). The calculation of DO maintains its statistical significance, regardless of the overall amount of words in the study database.
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

Candela and Mariotto 7
In studying our sample of news stories, we kept in consideration Andrea Candela’s (2013) work and Giovanni Caprara’s careful analysis of news coverage of science in the pages of Corriere della
Sera (Caprara, 2009). Based on these, we expected that our sample of news stories from La Stampa and La Domenica del Corriere would reflect the attitude toward science that was rather common in most of the Italian daily press and weekly supplements. Just like in the United States and most
European countries, the discovery of X-rays and radioactivity gained a large public interest also in
Italy, mainly over the first decade of the century. This is attested to by the extensive press coverage that the new scientific findings received from 1903 onward. Some news often achieved the first page with a shoulder , as we noticed in La Stampa . The most intensive coverage was between 1903 and 1913 and from the late 1920s to the late 1930s.
It is worth pointing out that in the first decades of the twentieth century, the role of science journalist was not yet established in newspapers, and would develop later on, during the first half of the twentieth century and just in a few major newspapers, such as the Manchester Guardian and the New York Times (Bauer and Bucchi, 2007). At the time considered by our study, science was still regarded as a miracle, a marvel, a mystery, or, conversely, a danger or even sorcery. Radioactivity initially appeared to be in opposition to every known natural phenomenon, even to the basic laws of classical physics. For instance, radium was sometimes considered a kind of spiritual essence. It was defined as “eternal fire,” “perpetually exploding element,” or “eternal source of energy.” In our database of texts, we found reference to “antipathies” and “sympathies,” which were used to describe inner atomic forces and energies. This was undoubtedly an inheritance of the chemical and physical language of the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century science, inspired by alchemy.
After all, Ernest Rutherford himself used the word “transmutation” to describe some properties of radioactive emissions (Rutherford, 1937).
The journalistic coverage often left aside scientific issues and focused on curious topics, cultural details, or social and political consequences of those amazing discoveries. For example, La
Stampa reported about the spiritualists’ opposition to Scottish chemist William Ramsay, who was carrying out research on radioactive emissions. This group considered every scientific experience on atomic radiation a violence to the transcendent forces of nature. A few news stories have a mystical and at times esoteric undertone, such as those about the conjectural use of radium by the ancient Egyptians, radioactivity in flowers, miraculous healings, or the use of rays for creating life.
On a more pragmatic note, most of Italian and international newspapers were normally keen showing the practical applications of new scientific discoveries and futuristic inventions.
X-rays and radioactivity were generally perceived as important scientific findings, suitable for promoting technological progress in different fields, mainly in medical sciences. This is testified by the fact that these news stories often appeared on the first page, as in the case of La Stampa . We noticed that, in 1904, several articles emphasized the possibility of applying X-rays and radium in the treatment of cancer. In a few articles, we also found mention to the potential use of radioactivity for energy production. Most of the news stories on radiation, published in the first years after the scientific discoveries, focused on the unusual properties and particular nature of these weird, and sometimes eerie, phenomena. The language in these news stories is often sensationalist: this is particularly clear in headlines, often composed of striking expressions, undoubtedly aimed at drawing the readers’ attention, such as “Rende la salute agli incurabili mediante l’impiego di una forza penetrante” (“… able to heal the incurables by way of a penetrating force”), “… magazzini di poderose energie” (“… warehouses of powerful energy”), “effluvi misteriosi” (mysterious
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

8 Public Understanding of Science
Table 1.
Corpus statistics, before and after normalization and grammatical tagging.
Size of the corpus = total amount of occurrences ( N ) = tokens
Breadth of vocabulary = total amount of graphic forms ( V )
Unrefined corpus
18,468
4941
Corpus after normalization and grammatical tagging
17,756
5195 effluvia), and “cure meravigliose” (“wonderful healings”). Words such as “mysteries,” “miracles,” and “marvels,” were also used. X-rays and radioactive elements were defined “strange substances” and “magic elements”; for instance, radium was regarded as a “living substance.” Some articles, published in La Stampa , went so far as to report some rumors about Edison trying to cure blindness by means of X-ray techniques.
We observed that the reporters from La Stampa , mostly anonymous, made extensive use of technical jargon, often without explaining the meaning of the scientific words. On the contrary, the language in La Domenica del Corriere was more rhetorical and metaphorical, in agreement with its readership’s cultural background.
In most of the coverage of the topic between 1903 and 1913, the message passed on to the public emphasized mainly the benefits and downplayed the risks of those ground-breaking discoveries. On the contrary, from the late 1920s to 1930s, although radioactive emissions and X-rays were still perceived as healthy energies, journalists also highlighted the possible health risks associated with radiation. Scientists themselves, such as Pierre and Marie Curie, Antoine Henri Becquerel, and
Frederick Soddy, sometimes expressed hesitation about the ambiguous properties of the new energy source. As pointed out by Clark (1997), doubts gradually increased from the early 1920s, when the concept of “risk” associated with the use of radiation started to gain some public relevance.
The story of Becquerel, who, in 1901, had caused himself a painful burn by carrying a little piece of radium in his waistcoat pocket (Fernandez, 2006: 38), had become widespread news, echoed by different newspapers. Worries and controversial feelings, which had timidly appeared in the public discourse already in the first decade of the century, became more and more frequent after the
Great War.
Our unrefined corpus of words is composed of 18,468 occurrences. After the standardized normalization procedure, its size is 17,756 occurrences (Table 1). According to Bolasco and Pavone (2010), a minimum of 15,000 occurrences are enough to guarantee statistical significance. A corpus is generally considered small when the occurrences are about 15,000, medium-sized when they are about 45,000, and big with more than 100,000 occurrences. Hence, our corpus fits in the first category.
The calculation of DOs for our whole corpus enabled us to come up with the words that have the highest frequency in comparison with the average journalistic language (Table 2).
The words with the highest DO in our analysis are the following: Curie, irradiations, emanation/s, atom/s, ray/s, cancer/s, and radium. The main reference is to the figure and scientific activity of
Marie Curie, the most prominent female scientist of that time. The words “irradiations,”
“emanation/s,” “atom/s,” and “ray/s” are well represented in terms of DOs: they were normally used by journalists to represent powers, forces, and the nature of X-rays and radioactive elements.
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

Candela and Mariotto 9
Table 2.
The words with the highest DOs in our corpus, along with their number of occurrences.
Words (graphic form)
Curie
Irradiazioni (irradiations)
Emanazioni (emanations)
Emanazione (emanation)
Atomi (atoms)
Atomo (atom)
Raggi (rays)
Cancri (cancers)
Cancro (cancer)
Radio (radium)
Radioattiva / o (radioactive)
Radioattivi (radioactive)
Radioattività (radioactivity)
Radiazioni (radiations)
Scoperta (discovery)
Terapeutica (therapeutic)
Proiettili (bullets)
Miracoli (miracles)
Prezioso (precious)
Meraviglia (marvel)
Cura (cure/treatment)
Misterioso (mysterious)
Malato (sick)
Medicina (medicine)
Malattia (illness)
Potenza (power)
Pericolose (dangerous)
Danno (damage)
Danni (damages)
Rischio (risk)
DOs
23.7
22.9
21.2
9.7
9.1
−0.6
—
40.1
34.4
34.2
30.8
27.5
24.7
24.0
1657.6
497.6
475.4
177.1
382.2
257.8
275.6
243.8
84.4
200.9
182.8/137.3
182.2
145.7
139.7
93.6
57.5
Occurrences
6
1
0
7
10
8
2
6
24
6
7
7
7
8
9
13
35
5
19
83
18
10
24
16
39
5
38
9
13
18
DOs: deviation on occurrences.
Their scientific/technical meaning was not always clarified by journalists, and, in some circumstances, they were used with esoteric connotations in order to highlight the amazing, marvelous, and extraordinary, but also ambiguous, properties of radiations. As shown in Table 2, terms such as
“miracles,” “precious,” “marvel,” and “mysterious” are well represented in our ranking of the words with the highest DOs. In cases in which journalists attempted to explain their scientific meaning, we often noticed the use of military metaphors, and especially in La Domenica del
Corriere that was more sensationalist. So, “irradiations,” “emanations,” “atoms,” (particles) and
“rays” were frequently compared with bullets (seven occurrences in three news articles), bombs, or bombings. As listed in Table 2, one of the most recurring words in our analysis is “atom/s,” mainly included in news stories dealing with physical and chemical topics related to radiation.
They were used to introduce the discovery of X-rays and radioactivity to the lay public, often using common and striking words from the popular language and even defining radiations as the new philosopher’s stone.
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

10 Public Understanding of Science
Table 3.
Semantic categories of adjectives and their occurrence in the studied corpus.
Semantic category
Negative
Positive
Negative/positive
Number of lexical units
107
252
—
Number of total occurrences
165
483
0.34
The words “cancer/s,” “cure/treatment,” “illness,” “sick,” and “therapeutic” are also “over- represented” in our database in comparison with the average journalistic language: this reflects the fact that, as discussed above, the news media regarded X-rays and radioactivity as possible and useful medical instruments in the fight against cancer and other diseases. Therefore, the framing of these discoveries in the news press was generally a favorable one.
The term “illness” (10 occurrences in six news articles), a clear reference to the possible use of radiation for cancer treatment, was given a negative connotation only in the news about the death of Marie
Curie; here, the contact with radium was regarded as potentially responsible for her lethal disease.
Additionally, we calculated DOs for selected terms, such as “risk/s” (rischio/i), “damage/s”
(danno/i), “danger” (pericolo), “cure/treatment” (cura), “benefit/s” (benefici/o), “miracle/s”
(miracolo/i), and “marvel/s” (meraviglia), so as to test and possibly confirm the results of the qualitative analysis. It is key to observe that words implying possible negative health consequences, such as
“risk/s” and “damage/s,” were under-represented (Table 2), that is, their relative frequency in our corpus was below their average frequency in journalistic language.
Before going further, it is worth acknowledging the possible limitations stemming from the time gap between the analyzed news stories and the corpus embedded in the software. Both corpuses are from the general press, but the news stories we analyzed were written many decades earlier than the stories (published on the daily newspaper La Repubblica ) that compose the reference corpus embedded within TalTac. However, we wish to highlight that all terms marked by the higher DOs in our sample (listed in Table 2) are still in use in contemporary Italian language; in fact, none became obsolete in time, and this can be regarded as strengthening the relevance of our results.
We also tried to quantitatively define the main semantic connotation (positive or negative) or
“tone” that characterizes our news stories. Our goal was to once again confirm the above observation that the framing of radiation was a generally positive and favorable one in the analyzed texts.
To do so, we used one of the most powerful tools provided by the software, which enables to scan the vocabulary of adjectives included in its reference database. The software associates each of the adjectives in the database with either a “positive connotation” or a “negative” one. It then calculates the ratio of positive to negative adjectives, which, in turn, enables to gain insight into the general framing of the topic reported by the news media. In this case, the value obtained by the calculation is 0.34: positive adjectives (483) are almost three times more represented than negative ones (165), and this further suggests a generally “optimistic” coverage of radiation, which tended to emphasize the benefits and downplay potential risks (Table 3).
Based on our qualitative and quantitative analysis, we can conclude that the news media framing of X-rays and radioactivity was mainly a favorable one, in agreement with a positive image of science and technology among the lay public in the early decades of the last century. Both newspapers represented the physical phenomenon of radiation as an important and extraordinary discovery,
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

Candela and Mariotto 11 necessary for the well-being and progress of mankind. Back then, science was often portrayed as an enterprise that worked for the common good; scientists were usually perceived as benefactors, sometimes even regarded as “magicians” and “modern alchemists.” As pointed out above, this was entirely the case before WWI; during those years, the news media passed on a rather positive image of the progress in scientific knowledge brought on by those leading-edge discoveries, downplaying the risks and dangers of “radioactive contamination.” This is confirmed by our quantitative analysis, which revealed the under-representation of words related to the potential risky implications of radiation. An instrumental figure in this respect was Marie Curie, often described as a “heroine of science.” The “sound” of the stories writing about Madame Curie was completely positive and even hagiographic. She was depicted as a heroine even after her death (1934) due to aplastic anemia caused by exposure to radiations.
Also, the quantitative analysis of adjectives with opposing semantic connotation helped to assess the general tendency, in the Italian news reporting on radiation, to highlight the benefits of radiation and only partially consider its potential harmful effects.
Our study, by investigating the message that was conveyed to public opinion, provides possible insight into how this might have influenced public perception of the benefits and risks associated with the use of radiation.
Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge Editor in Chief, Professor Bauer, for his insightful comments. Two anonymous reviewers are also acknowledged for their constructive comments and suggestions, which greatly improved the quality of the article. The authors are grateful to Fabio M. Binda as well, for his support to the research.
Funding
This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
Gli apparecchi Röntgen nelle ambulanze militari , 6 November1904.
Applicazioni del radio in medicina , 6 November 1904.
Un grande taumaturgo. Rende la salute agli incurabili mediante l’impiego di una forza penetrante , 25 March 1906.
La morte di Pietro Curie , 6 May 1906.
Il radio e le pietre preziose , 8 July 1906.
I raggi Roentgen contro la canizie , 29 July 1906.
L’energia del radium , 14 October 1906.
L’influenza del radio sul corpo umano , 30 December 1906.
I raggi Röntgen e la dogana , 14–21 February 1915.
Minuscoli magazzini di poderose energie , 11–18 April 1915.
Un nuovo strumento distruttivo , 29 August–5 September 1915.
La famiglia Raggi X , 25 November 1917.
Le meraviglie dei raggi X. La Cineradiografia , 25 April–2 May 1920.
Le vetture radiografiche in Francia , 15–22 August 1925.
Effluvi misteriosi , 26 June 1927.
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

12 Public Understanding of Science
La donna con gli occhi Röntgen , 25 December 1927.
Alippi, T., Nel mondo misterioso dell’atomo , 8–15 February 1920.
Alippi, T., Dal mondo atomico al mondo stellare , 20 March 1927.
Alippi, T., L’elio, gas raro e singolare , 3 June 1934.
Alippi, T., Le meraviglie del mondo invisibile. L’atomo , 5 August 1934.
Altre esperienze fotografiche con la luce Röntgen all’Università di Pisa , 23 January 1896.
La fotografia attraverso i corpi , 25 January 1896.
Galileo Ferraris sui raggi Röntgen , 2 March 1896.
I raggi Röntgen e la medicina. Obbiezioni scientifiche sulla loro applicazione , 23 March
1896.
Cinque milioni per ricuperar la vista. Edison e i raggi Roentgen , 25 November 1896.
Sulla scoperta di Edison per ridare la vista ai ciechi , 28 November 1896.
Una scoperta meravigliosa , 30 May 1901.
I miracoli d’un metallo prezioso , 29 March 1903.
Miracoli d’acrobatismo e prodigi di forza , 3 May 1903.
Una cieca che riacquista la vista col “ radium e i raggi X ,” 25 August 1903.
Onori agli scopritori del radium , 13 November 1903.
Ingenti premi ai ricercatori del “ radium ,” 18 December 1903.
La scoperta dell’esistenza del “ radium ” nell’acqua e nel petrolio , 25 December 1903.
Il Radium , 30 December 1903.
I ricevimenti ufficiali di Capodanno , 2 January 1904.
Il radium era già conosciuto dagli antichi egizi?
, 3 January 1904.
Un importante serbatoio di “ radium ,” 8 January 1904.
Le particolarità e le meraviglie dei raggi N , 9 January 1904.
Il radium e gli spiritisti , 15 January 1904.
I miracoli della radio-attività in medicina , 17 January 1904.
Il radio e la biologia , 21 January 1904.
La radioattività dei fiori , 26 January 1904.
Montagne contenenti radium , 1 February 1904.
Una conferenza dell’ing. Sella sulla radio-attività. Le prime ricerche fatte in Italia , 6 March
1904.
La cura del cancro col “radium” e coi raggi Röntgen , 28 March 1904.
Il radio e le cure meravigliose , 1 April 1904.
I pericoli del Radium , 12 July 1904.
La pretesa creazione della vita per mezzo del “ radium ,” 8 August 1905.
Il radio può dar la vita?
, 4 December 1905.
“ La vita intima della materia ,” 23 March 1906.
Le scoperte del prof. Battelli , 15 June 1906.
L’azione del “ radio ” sulle pietre preziose , 9 July 1906.
La produzione del “ radio ,” 13 April 1907.
Le dolorose avventure della materia , 28 September 1908, p. 3.
Il Radio introdotto nelle lenti da occhiali per rinforzare la vista , 18 May 1913.
Il regno dell’infinitesimo , 7 March 1928.
La disintegrazione degli atomi e la durata della terra , 8 March 1929.
Cento milioni di proiettili protonici per realizzare l’esperimento , 3 May 1932.
La creazione dell’elemento 93 , 5 June 1934.
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

Candela and Mariotto 13
L’enorme portata della scoperta di Fermi , 5–6 June 1934.
Il sogno degli alchimisti si realizza , 6–7 June 1934.
L’uomo che fabbrica l’oro. Ha torto l’ing. Dunikowsky?
, 17 February 1935.
I “ raggi della morte ” saranno applicati in Germania per la difesa antiaerea , 29 June 1938.
Le esperienze di Marconi sui raggi misteriosi , 25 April 1939.
È stato trovato il “ raggio della morte?
,” 1 November 1939.
Il “ raggio della morte ” di un vecchietto americano , 14 October 1940.
Una grossa truffa col “ raggio elettrico della morte ,” 16 October 1940.
Avi, Dott., La scoperta dell’ “ elemento 91 ,” 28–29 September 1934.
Bravetta, E., Varietà Scientifiche. Il carbon fossile fattore di civiltà—Le sorgenti di energia che potranno sostituirlo quando sarà esaurito—L’acqua-Il calore del Sole—Le meraviglie della fotochimica—L’energia del movimento diurno terrestre—Il calore interno della Terra—La disgregazione dell’atomo—Il radio , 9 June 1913.
Castelfranchi, G., Alchimia nel secolo XX , 22 August 1934.
Gautier, E. and Goron M.-F., Fior di Galera, Romanzo d’appendice, January–September 1902 , p. 2 e p. 4.
Peri, G., L’assalto al fantastico mondo degli atomi , 10 April 1928.
Peri, G., I misteri dell’atomo , 6 May 1932.
Plave, H.J., I misteri del radio , 27 November 1933.
Quadrone, E., Passeggiata a lume di Radium. Fenomeni radioattivi nella valle di Lurisia , 15
October 1933.
Quadrone, E., Fontane di giovinezza. La scoperta a Merano di 70 sorgenti radioattive. Quindici milioni di acqua miracolosa , 13 November 1937.
Vivenza, A., Il “radium” e le acque del Clitunno , 25 December 1903.
Zappa, P., I piccoli soli luminosi in un capannone abbandonato , 8 February 1938.
Zappa, P., Come si curano i tumori e quali risultati si ottengono , 16 February 1938.
Zappa, P., Il radium, elemento magico. Diagnosi precoce per combattere il cancro , 17 February
1938.
References
Anderson A (2009) Media, politics and climate change: Towards a new research agenda. Sociology Compass
3(2): 166–182.
Bauer MW and Bucchi M (eds.) (2007) Journalism, Science and Society: Science Communication Between
News and Public Relations . New York, NY: Routledge.
Benelli E (2003) The role of the media in steering public opinion on healthcare issues. Health Policy 63:
179–186.
Benford RD and Snow DA (2000) Framing processes and social movements: An overview and assessment.
Annual Review of Sociology 26: 611–639.
Bolasco S and Pavone P (2010) Automatic dictionary- and rule-based systems for extracting information from text. Studies in Classification, Data Analysis, and Knowledge Organization 5: 189–198.
Bordoni C and Fossati F (1985) Dal feuilleton al fumetto. Generi e scrittori della letteratura popolare
[From serial novels to comics. Genres and writers of popular literature]. Rome: Editori Riuniti.
Bradley J (ed.) (2000) Learning to Glow: A Nuclear Reader . Tucson, AZ: University of Arizona Press.
Brecher R and Brecher E (1969) The Rays: A History of Radiology in the United States and Canada . Baltimore,
MD: Williams and Wilkins.
Broderick M (ed.) (1996) Hibakusha Cinema. Hiroshima, Nagasaki and the Nuclear Image in Japanese Film .
London; New York, NY: Kegan Paul International.
Bucchi M (2011) La scienza nella stampa quotidiana [Science coverage in daily news]. In: Cassata F and
Pogliano C (eds) Scienze e cultura dell’Italia Unita. Storia d’Italia. Annali [Science and culture in united
Italy. Italian history. Annals] (Vol. 26). Turin: Einaudi, pp. 297–320.
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

14 Public Understanding of Science
Bucchi M and Trench B (eds) (2008) Handbook of Public Communication of Science and Technology .
London; New York, NY: Routledge.
Candela A (2013) Dal sogno degli alchimisti agli incubi di Frankenstein. La scienza e il suo immaginario nei mass media [From the alchemists’ dream to Frankenstein’s nightmares. Science and its imagery in the media]. Milan: FrancoAngeli.
Caprara G (2009) L’avventura della scienza. Sfide, invenzioni e scoperte nelle pagine del Corriere della Sera
[The adventure of science. Challenges, inventions and discoveries in the pages of “Corriere della Sera”].
Milan: Rizzoli.
Castells M (2009) Communication Power . Oxford; New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Chapman S and Lupton D (1994) The Fight for Public Health: Principles and Practice of Media Advocacy .
London: BMJ Publishing Group.
Chong D and Druckman JN (2007) Framing theory. Annual Review of Political Science 10: 103–126.
Clark C (1997) Radium Girls: Women and Industrial Health Reform, 1910–1935 . Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.
Darnton R (1975) Writing news and telling stories. Daedalus 104(2): 175–194.
de la Peña CT (2003) The Body Electric: How Strange Machines Built the Modern American . New York, NY:
New York University Press.
Entman R (1993) Framing: Toward clarification of a fractured paradigm. Journal of Communication 43:
51–58.
Epstein EJ (1981) The selection of reality. In: Abel E (ed.) What’s News: The Media in American Society . San
Francisco, CA: Institute for Contemporary Studies, pp. 119–132.
Farr RM and Moscovici S (eds) (1984) Social Representations . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Feinberg M and Willer R (2013) The moral roots of environmental attitudes. Psychological Science 24(1):
56–62.
Fernandez B (2006) Unraveling the Mystery of the Atomic Nucleus: A Sixty Year Journey 1896–1956 . New
York, NY; Heidelberg; Dordrecht; London: Springer.
Galtung J and Ruge MH (1965) The structure of foreign news. The presentation of the Congo, Cuba and
Cyprus crises in four Norwegian newspapers. Journal of Peace Research 2(1): 64–91.
Gamson WA and Modigliani A (1989) Media discourse and public opinion on nuclear power: A constructionist approach. American Journal of Sociology 95(1): 1–37.
Gavrila M (ed.) (2012) L’onda anomala dei media. Il rischio ambientale tra realtà e rappresentazione [The media tsunami. Environmental risk between reality and representation]. Milan: FrancoAngeli.
Gerson ES (2004) X-ray mania: The X-ray in advertising, circa 1895.
Radiographics 24(2): 544–551.
Giere RN (1988) Explaining Science. A Cognitive Approach . Chicago, IL; London: The University of Chicago
Press.
Gilliam FD and Bales SN (2001) Strategic frame analysis: Reframing America’s youth . Social Policy Report
15: Available at: http://repositories.cdlib.org/ccc/children/005S
Goffman E (1974) Frame Analysis: An Essay on the Organization of Experience . New York, NY: Harper &
Row.
Golding P and Elliott P (1979) Making the News . London: Longman.
Gorss JB, Lewenstein BV and Radin J (2005) The salience of small: Nanotechnology coverage in the American press . Paper presented at the 55th annual meeting of the International Communication Association, New
York, NY, 26–30 May 2005.
Gozzini G (2000) Storia del giornalismo [History of journalism]. Milan: Mondadori.
Guizzardi G (ed.) (2002) La scienza negoziata. Scienze biomediche nello spazio pubblico [Science and social negotiation. Biomedical sciences in the public arena]. Bologna: il Mulino.
Hajer MA (1995) The Politics of Environmental Discourse: Ecological Modernization and the Policy Process .
Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Hecht G (1998) The Radiance of France. Nuclear Power and National Identity after World War II . Cambridge,
MA: MIT Press.
Hendershot C (1997) The atomic scientists, science fiction films, and paranoia. Journal of American Culture
20(1): 31–41.
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

Candela and Mariotto 15
Herzig R (1999) Removing roots: “North American Hiroshima Maidens” and the X Ray. Technology and
Culture 40(4): 723–745.
Iyengar S (1991) Is Anyone Responsible? How Television Frames Political Issues . Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Jensen KB (ed.) (2002) A Handbook of Media and Communication Research. Qualitative and Quantitative
Methodologies . London: Routledge.
LaFollette M (1990) Making Science Our Own: Public Images of Science, 1910–1955 . Chicago, IL: The
University of Chicago Press.
Lavine M (2013) The First Atomic Age. Scientists, Radiations, and the American Public, 1895–1945 . New
York, NY: Macmillan.
Lee AJ (1976) The Origins of the Popular Press, 1855–1914 . London: Croom Helm.
Lewenstein B, Radin J and Diels J (2007) Nanotechnology in the media: A preliminary analysis. In: Roco MC and Bainbridge WS (eds) Nanotechnology: Societal Implications II: Individual Perspectives . Dordrecht:
Springer, pp. 258–265.
Macklis RM (1990) Radithor and the era of Mild Radium Therapy. Journal of the American Medical
Association 264(5): 614–618.
Mariani F (1976) “Realtà romanzesca” nella “Domenica del Corriere” 1922–1941 [“Fictional reality” in the pages of “Domenica del Corriere” 1922–1941]. Ravenna: Longo.
Morrisson MS (2007) Modern Alchemy. Occultism and the Emergence of Atomic Theory . Oxford and New
York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Mott FL (1950) American Journalism. A History of Newspapers in the United States through 260 Years: 1690 to 1950 . New York, NY: Macmillan.
Murialdi P (1996) Storia del giornalismo italiano. Dalle gazzette a Internet [History of Italian journalism.
From the early gazettes to the internet]. Bologna: il Mulino.
Nelkin D (1995) Selling Science: How the Press Covers Science and Technology . New York, NY: W.H. Freeman.
Nelson TE, Oxley ZM and Clawson RA (1997) Towards a psychology of framing effects. Political Behavior
19(3): 221–246.
Neresini F and Magaudda P (eds) (2011) La scienza sullo schermo. La rappresentazione della tecnoscienza nella televisione italiana [Science on screen. The representation of technoscience by Italian TV networks]. Bologna: il Mulino.
Neuman WR, Just MR and Crigler AN (1992) Common Knowledge: News and the Construction of Political
Meaning . Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Nisbet MC and Lewenstein BW (2002) Biotechnology and the American media: The policy process and the
Elite Press, 1970 to 1999. Science Communication 23(4): 359–391.
Ong WJ (1988) Orality and Literacy. The Technologizing of the Word . New York, NY: Routledge.
Pallottino P (1988) Storia dell’illustrazione italiana: Libri e periodici a figure dal XV al XX secolo [History of Italian illustration: Illustrated books and periodicals from the 15th to the 20th century]. Bologna:
Zanichelli.
Pasquaré FA and Oppizzi P (2012) How do the media affect public perception of climate change and geohazards? An Italian case study. Global and Planetary Change 90–91: 152–157.
Pasquaré FA, Bettinetti R, Fumagalli S and Vignati D (2013) Public health benefits and risks of fish consumption: Current scientific evidence v. media coverage. Public Health Nutrition 16: 1885–1892.
Rachino G and Rachino P (2009) Miniera di Radio e Sorgenti Radioattive di Lurisia [Radon mine and radioactive springs in Lurisia]. Cuneo: Primalpe.
Rentetzi M (2007) Trafficking Materials and Gendered Experimental Practices: Radium Research in Early
Twentieth Century Vienna . New York, NY: Columbia University Press.
Rosenthal P (1991) The nuclear mushroom cloud as cultural image. American Literary History 3(1): 63–92.
Rutherford E (1937) The Newer Alchemy: Based on the Henry Sidgwick Memorial Lecture delivered at
Newnham College . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Ryan C (1991) Prime Time Activism: Media Strategies for Grassroots Organizing . Boston, MA: South End Press.
Schon DA and Rein M (1994) Frame Reflection: Toward the Resolution of Intractable Policy Controversies .
New York, NY: Basic Books.
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014

16 Public Understanding of Science
Sclove RE (1989) From Alchemy to Atomic War: Frederick Soddy’s “Technology Assessment” of Atomic
Energy, 1900–1915. Science, Technology, & Human Values 14(2): 163–194.
Shapiro JF (2002) Atomic Bomb Cinema. The Apocalyptic Imagination on Film . London and New York, NY:
Routledge.
Soddy F (1903) Possible future applications of radium. The Times Literary Supplement , 17 July, p. 225.
Soddy F (1909) The Interpretation of Radium. Being the Substance of Six Free Popular Experimental Lectures
Delivered at the University of Glasgow, 1908 . London: John Murray; New York, NY: G.P. Putnam’s
Sons.
Stannard NJ (1988) Radioactivity and Health. A History . Springfield, VA: Battelle Memorial Institute.
Thurs DP (2007) Science Talk: Changing Notions of Science in American Culture . New Brunswick, NJ:
Rutgers University Press.
Tuchman G (1977) The exception proves the rule: The study of routine news practice. In: Hirsch PM, Miller
PV and Kline FG (eds) Strategies for Communication Research. Sage Annual Reviews of Communication
Research (Vol. 6). Beverly Hills, CA: SAGE, pp. 43–62.
van Lente D (ed.) (2012) The Nuclear Age in Popular Media. A Transnational History, 1945–1965 . New
York, NY: Macmillan.
Wallack L and Dorfman L (1996) Media advocacy: A strategy for advancing policy and promoting health.
Health Education Quarterly 23: 293–317.
Wallack L, Dorfman L, Jernigan D and Themba M (1993) Media Advocacy and Public Health: Power for
Prevention . Newbury Park, CA: SAGE.
Weart SR (1985) The atomic age: The heyday of myth and cliché. Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 41: 38–43.
Weart SR (1988) Nuclear Fear. A History of Images . Cambridge, MA; London: Harvard University Press.
Wiegman O, Gutteling JM, Boer H and Houwen RJ (1989) Newspaper coverage of technological and environmental hazards and the reactions of readers. Journalism Quarterly 66: 844–853.
Willis K (1995) The origins of British Nuclear Culture, 1895–1939. Journal of British Studies 34(1): 59–89.
Zeman SC and Amundson AM (eds) (2004) Atomic Culture: How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the
Bomb . Boulder, CO: University Press of Colorado.
Author biographies
Andrea Candela is a Historian of Science. His main research interests focus on Scientific Imaginary, History of Science Communication, and History of Earth Sciences. He has been teaching Science Communication at
Insubria University since 2007.
Federico Pasquaré Mariotto is an Earth Scientist with a research focus on Geotectonics and another on
Environmental Sociology. He has been teaching Geoenvironmental Hazard Communication at Insubria
University since 2001.
Downloaded from pus.sagepub.com
by guest on September 6, 2014